Alice the Tiger
by Q u e e n V a m p
Summary: Artemis never had real dreams. Just bits and pieces. She blames her creativity. ArtemisxCameron
1. Lone Tiger

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **Painting Flowers by All Time Low  
**Rating: **T for language  
**Genre: **Humor, Angst, Romance  
**Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion  
_**Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt  
**Inspiration: **All you fabulous people who introduced me and my own wacky ideas

**N/A: **sorry if this may suck . . . T~T

* * *

_"Strange maze, what is this place?  
I hear voices over my shoulder.  
Nothing's making sense at all. . ."_

* * *

She was beginning to feel much like the girl who chased the rabbit, drank the wine and took the pill. Locked up inside herself, locked up inside this shaky nightmare filled with familiar faces and estrange places. Surrounded by so many and so alone.

On the nights when she was allowed sleep—_it was rough the first night, four hours of sleep and then a brief meet-and-greet with her said 'team' before continuing on with a twenty hour day_—she laid awake until she was lulled to bed by the sounds of the ocean, and dreamt of those she missed.

Artemis never had real dreams. Just bits and pieces.

Scraps of dreams.

Shards of time and things that happen the day before.

She blames her creativity.

_Fire bright, emerald green, smiles, hugs, kisses, and warmth. _Wally.

She smiles when she dreams about him because she misses him and for wild blazing milliseconds she ponders _why _she chose to do Nightwing this favor.

But she knows why.

She was raised on this life. Raised on blood money, taught in fatality, and fed lethal assassin knowhow with a rusty spoon. Born from the best, raised to be better.

For years she knew nothing else, but she knew it was wrong and she got away while she could.

But nothing ever just ends there. Ghosts and shadows from her past came to call and want collection on what they've taught her, want reason for why she left them, demand apologizes (that she would not mean and they would not care) for the betraying knife she'd twisted into their backs.

One in particular, a very certain, very _close_, particular would have wanted all that ten-fold.

Cameron Mahkent, Icicle Junior, and her once best friend.

* * *

_"Wonder, why do we race?  
And everyday we're runnin' in circles, such a funny way to fall. . ."_

* * *

Aqualad had not informed her on who would be on this team, but it doesn't matter because nothing could have prepared her for seeing him again.

_Icy cool, ocean blue, smirks, jokes, laughs, and a cool heat. _Cameron.

She dreamt of him too; of when they were younger.

The shy first smiles and introduction of names, sneaking into movie theaters and running quickly when all stealth failed them, watching dirty TV shows and practicing kissing in shelter of blanket forts—_hot and cold, beautiful, wonderful, and _alive—and claiming innocence whenever the finger was pointed at them for mischeif.

They were quite the pair back then.

Artemis yearns to brush upon more memories but she wisely cuts herself off. Nostalgic as she was for those old times before everything started plummeting downwards towards hell, she couldn't allow herself to be compromised by her position. Too many lives, and her own, were on the line to even consider getting close to Cameron.

It was too dangerous.

She couldn't trust him.

Last time they met she'd stabbed him in the back, as did M'gann and Conner, for the good of the mission; she couldn't go through that again.

She couldn't put _him through that._

She knew him, knew his life, he didn't deserve it.

One day on the main deck, the Terror Twins were stating their open questions and calling both Kaldur and Artemis out on their sudden appearance in their community. Artemis retaliated back coolly and met Terror's eyes head on, then her gaze shifted to Cameron.

Cameron's eyes bore into her, and for a moment Artemis blindly wonders if he _knew. _

Seeing him again he hadn't cared much for her alias's features or really anything about her; his undivided attention was focused on Tuppence Terror—_which only led her to believe he had a thing for blondes—_and heard him brag about his fleeting time on the jailbird lifestyle when he'd hit on M'gann disguised as her.

Sneering, the platinum blonde pinched his wrist and like a southern lady told him to save it for the Martian girl then.

Cameron walks away, impassive and grinning in Kaldur's direction. "I'm wearing her down."

* * *

_"Tried to open up my eyes.  
I'm hopin' for a chance to make it alright. . ."_

* * *

She felt his eyes own her whilst she fought. Analyzing her movements any free chance he got to spare her a look as she swung and tackles and launches nets to capture her targets—_she misses her green suit oppose to this orange one and her bow and arrows_—and shoves aside all feeling as she tackles Nightwing to the ground, pinning him hard enough to bruise and viciously snapping the collar around his neck.

He winces, while fighting back, but seems to get the message that things aren't going well on her end and she's more than a little pissed.

His legs lock around her—_he is way too flexible for his own good_—and throws her off of him and while she takes subtle joy in shocking the crap out of him, it quickly dies when Kaldur takes his chance to pass off the flash drive (via punch to the gut) and the leave with their hostages.

* * *

_ "When I wake up, the dream isn't done  
I wanna see your face, and know I made it home."_

* * *

She watches Mount Justice go up in flames—_and with it every memory, moment, every stupid human sentiment her heart had begun to carry with her cushier civvie lifestyle_—and could only stare at the detonator in her hands, panic clear in her eyes as she realizes that _yes _she had been the one to do it.

All according to plan, but . . . it felt wrong somehow.

Mount Justice wasn't only the place where she and the Team had prepped for missions. They hung out there, became a family there, learnt each other's strengths and weaknesses and true selves.

In her mind's eye she traces the Zeta-tube room, the first time entering it in years it had not changed; the kitchen where M'gann perfected her cooking recipes; the TV room where the Team huddled for movie night and launched into furious video game battles; the couch where she and Wally had passed out on each other after cramming for SATs.

It was gone.

The place where she could trace back and remember, though the memories remained.

"Hey, cat lady!" she twitches and turns in time to find Cameron standing behind her in the corridor; the dim lights of the Black Manta's sub made the ice of his glassy exoskeleton reflect eerily blue.

Their eyes lock—_how different did Zatanna's charm make her look? Could he see her? The real her?_—and she matches his stare levelly with her own.

"What did you say your name was?" he asks, brows drawling together in confusion as if he was trying to place where he remembers her from.

"I didn't." she bites out. Her eyes glaze over his shoulder to find that they are now alone and she is boxed into a corner, between the door leading to her room and the wall.

Not a safe place to be.

"Well, I'm asking now aren't I?" Something flickers across his features—his voice light and curious like when they were young. His eyes narrow and his mouth curls upward, challenging her like all those times they were forced to duel each other. As usual he baits the hook and waits for her to pounce. "Care to share?"

"Tigress." She answers, and wonders if her voice sounds different too because there's lights going off in Cameron's eyes.

They stand there for a moment in silence and he nods, digesting this and with an upward grin turns on his heel to make his way back to wherever he'd come from.

"I think _Alice _would have been much better suited, but whatever."

* * *

**He knows! *jumps out of window***

**Personally, I have lots of ideas for Artemis as Tigress because I think she can expand more as herself, learn more, explore, and be with Cameron because Cameron freakin' ROCKS.**

**Please review, (even if it's to tell me to fix something I missed) make my day better because I swear if I have to hear my sister scream blood murder/apply for a job/think about college/think about money/think about tomorrow one more time I'm going to go bat-shit crazy here in under two seconds.**

**~QueenVamp**


	2. Icy Hearts

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **The Poison by The All-American Rejects  
**Rating: **T for language  
**Genre: **Humor, Angst, Romance  
**Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion  
_**Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt  
**Inspiration: **All you fabulous people who introduced me

**N/A: **Lyrics work but if you listen to the song its all soft and sweet.

**N/A 2**: Thanks for all the reviews!

* * *

_"You were so young, and I guess I'm old  
Open your eyes, I'll keep mine closed."_

* * *

In the book, in the cartoon, in the movie: Alice gets dizzy and delirious with confusion and questions everyone once she falls down the rabbit hole. That's the part of Alice she forsaken, the part she hated the most and declared she would never fall to. She would know her situation, and with her bow, her wit, and her Team (her securities) she'd survive Wonderland to the best of advantages.

Sadly, she couldn't have foreseen these looming evils.

_If he looks at me one more time . . . _Artemis silently swears under her breath when she feels a pensive stare burning into the back of her neck. He seemed to be having a tad of a bi-polar reaction to her being there, sometimes he'd look at her like he was mulling over turning her into an ice statue and others he looks at her so happily, that the reason he arrived to the main deck early each morning was just to see her.

She ignores him because it's easier to pretend, easier to lie.

After all these years it's still her go to solution for things she would rather not deal with.

And after all these years it's the Team who forces her to break that habit of ignoring the elephant in the room.

"Tigress," Kaldur's tone makes her turn her head. "It seems that Icicle Junior has taken up a habit of watching you, care to explain?"

Artemis welds her eyes shut for a moment and sighs, opening them to find Kaldur's harsh blues.

"I know him. From my old days before I joined the team."

It's vague in case someone may be listening.

Kaldur's eyes narrow and she can see the rushing thoughts shooting off in his mind as his mouth becomes a thin line. "Very well, I'll be sure to keep him at a distance from you."

* * *

_"I prefer standing, you take your seat  
I'll be wide awake, you'll be fast asleep."_

* * *

So, like that Kaldur is watching Cameron, Cameron is watching Artemis and Artemis is looking anywhere but those so pretty-there-girl-worthy eyes.

She's patrolling the warehouse they're currently holding up until they move a group of teens to a more secure location later on tonight, and instead of searching for foreign invaders (friends) she's contemplating about what to do about Cameron and Kaldur and everything else with a sleep deprived addled mind.

"Well . . . you're not lookin' so hot there Alley Cat."

It's Cameron.

"Why aren't you at your post?!" she shouts, wondering exactly _how _he got on this mission and _how _he snuck up on her, she's clutching a kunai knife in her already white knuckled fist before she knows what to do with it.

"Calm down, Alley Cat, I'm not gonna hurt you." His lopsided smirk says otherwise but, in truth, she knows he's teasing. But _Tigress _doesn't know that.

"I'm warning you." She hisses flashing too much teeth and Cameron fakes a shiver.

"Ooh, so scared . . . or is it your bad acting?" He cocks a brow and, infuriated, she launches three knives at him and—_being the flirty little bastard he is—_dodges all three with practiced ease and grins. In the time it took him to dodge she grabs her handheld crossbow and began shooting off arrows.

He put up a wall of ice to protect himself and then flattens it onto her floor, he pauses—_waiting to_ _see if any of them would detonate in his face like last time—_and then steps onto the ice and outright laughing asks: "Best you've got _Alice_? You know, maybe you're not her I'm thinking of. The girl I knew wouldn't let a chance for the sly to pass her up."

Too pissed to responds normally: she growls.

She gets low, hunching at her knees and ready to pounce for the attack like a real tiger, like she practiced, whilst she's airborne she realizes what she's doing.

Cameron is egging her on, getting her to playfight with him like when they were kids. Red flag!

Play fighting?_ Now _of all times?

Oh, Kaldur would have her head.

She twists in midair, nearly hitting Cameron, and land crouches on the ground beside him. Her leg fans outward with power rivaling someone twice her size and knocks Icicle Junior to the ground. His head cracks against the linoleum floor and he cries out.

She places her heel purposely over his windpipe and sneers down at him. "Sadisfied?"

[_What's going on over there?_] Kaldur's voice comes out clear through their identical headsets and Cameron shoots her a glare, warning her not to say anything.

She taps the comm button and coolly replies.

"Fine, just showing a stray back to his post."

She let's Cameron roll up and Kaldur switches exclusively to Cameron's earpiece, growling commands with leveled passive aggression, heeded reminders and faint worthy threats. Needless to say, Kaldur gave her the chance for a clean get away.

* * *

_"And you'll fall down a hole.  
That's the one place we both know."_

* * *

She thought it was disgusting—_this chilling teen farming thing Kaldur had briefed her on earlier—_and had the twinge at her heartstrings to release them all from their pods, but Kaldur's eyes were practically daring her to do something to attract more attention to herself after her pow-wow with Cameron. And Cameron is far from relenting.

Oh, what she would give for her bow, an explosive arrow, and a razor to shave a target into the back of Kaldur's head.

_Gah, _she needs to get some sleep. Nights were longer, 'dreams' weirder.

Every second spent on solid ground made her crave to run home.

She would run home if she could, follow the scents she knew so well and treed her way through the jungle of cities and places and find her way.

Home. _Kettle brewing with tea. Men's colon. Two day old, dying flowers. Fast food wrappers. And clean lavender scented clothes._

She wants to, but couldn't. Too many eyes.

"Alright let's head out!" She calls to her 'team' and—_albeit not without a few straying glares_—they nod and follow her.

"Where does that newbie get off being so demanding?" Tuppence growls.

"Genetics." Cameron whispers back with a smirk.

She wants desperately to whip around an axel kick him in the throat but the thought of going to bed in an hour (even if it's to the strange dreams) is much more inviting. A bonus is she can finally get of this infernal mask—

Her foot slipped on a rock leading down to the half-submerged sub and her breath caught and she nearly yelped at the suddenly movement, but someone caught her elbow and steadied her. Strong, secure, and safe.

That was just like Kaldur to worry about her, she thought. "Thanks you, K—" she pauses mid-sentence when she looks into Cameron's infamous icy blues and austere frown. Her mouth goes dry.

"Don't mention it." He mutters and she tries to tug away but he grips onto her. "I've gottcha."

_No kidding. _She thinks and allows herself to be hoisted up on top of the sub and goes straight to her room and buries herself in her flat military pillow and sleeps to no avail.

* * *

_"You take me with you if you could, but I wouldn't go  
I guess that sometimes we both loose our minds  
To find a better road."_

* * *

In the end, Cameron had found a way around Kaldur and slips into her room after she was getting out of the shower. Her suit is zipped up, pads are on, weapons scattered, hair damp and her mask is off.

Even when he finally sees her face he is not discouraged. Her looks her in the eye, and he knows. "Artemis."

Her name sounds foreign and different because for months _Tigress _has been her name.

"So, you know?" Artemis whispers almost afraid to ask; afraid to put the question on the table; outwardly expose herself.

Cameron's eyes harden like pools of water during the winter, glassy and cold.

"_Of course, _I know." He sneers and his expression turns ugly for a moment before melting into that of relief.

His arms come around her—_tight, suffocating, cold, but _familiar _and oddly warm—_he begins to shift back to his human persona and his temperature slowly rises accordingly, but is still unnaturally low in a way that says he should be six feet under.

Like her.

Cameron buries his face in the crook of her shoulder, nose in her hair, lips on her neck, and all around her. "You're _alive._" He whispers, and leans back to look at her—_at her; into her eyes where he can truly see her—_and palms the sides of her face. "You're alive, you're alive. That's freakin' amazing." His breath is cool against her neck and sends a shiver down her spine.

He smiles and she feels like something is peeling away the layers to her heart.

"Cam . . ." she responds and it's heavy on her tongue because she hadn't said it in years.

"Artemis . . ." His smile dissolves and his gaze hardens again. "You _idiot._"

If she had time to respond to that she would have raised an eyebrow, but just as suddenly as he was praising her life he looks like he wants her dead.

"You're such an idiot! What are you doing here?!" His voice is low and harsh and he smacks the side of her head for good measure, as if it'll make her understand and annoyed she shoves him back and plants her hands on her hips.

"Cut it out Cam, so I'm alive. Big whoop." Her voice is as blasé as she can make it and her signatures untouchable badass veneer is crumbing because her face isn't hers face anymore. Cameron isn't impressed either.

"No, you're _alive—_which _believe me_—I'm happy about, but _everyone _thinks you're _dead_."

"Yeah, they do. And?"

_Keep it light, don't give too much away. _She warns herself.

Cameron looks ready to rip out his own hair. "You're father and Jade are contacting _everyone _in the Shadows to help them _kill _the Black Manta's spawn!"

Her eyes widen. "W—why are they doing that?!"

"Well, I don't know, it's not like he cut them off in traffic—"

"That was _one time._"

"—or something completely psychotic like that. They're doing this because they think _he _killed _you_!" Cameron hisses.

Panicking herself, she tries to calm them both down. "My dad probably just wants revenge for the hell of it. And Jade—I don't know, she must be high on hormones, or something!"

"Well, you can say that again because every criminal in Belle Reve wants to go spear fishing for your friend . . . and Jade broke into my house!"

"She always does that!" Artemis reminds.

"She brought her _spawn _and husband with her! And they threatened _me_! Do they do this sort of thing as a family often? It's like going to the park for them!"

"Hey, that's my _niece_!" She snarls and Cameron's head drops into his hand.

"Okay, _whatever, _for now. We've got bigger problems . . ."

"Hey," Artemis realizes and stops him short. "If you were so angry that you though Kaldur killed me, then _why are you here_?"

Cameron's eyebrow twitches. "I'm a double agent." And his mouth twitches oddly like he can't believe it himself. "I came here to help take down fish-boy or whatever. Hence, the reason Jade broke into my house—not that she really needed to we all sort of got the news at the same time, she just got angrier faster."

Artemis stares back at him for a moment.

Cameron, Cam, Frostbite, wonderful—_villain—_Cameron. He spoke like he had an obligation to be here, like he owed her, like he . . .

"Why are you here, Cameron?" she asks.

"I'm your best friend _remember_? If you think I won't avenge your death and can't recognize you in some wacky magic get-up then we shouldn't even be talking right now."

"But we're not friends Cam."

Hurt flashes in his eyes but he blinks it away and fixes his regal façade once again and bitterly spits out: "Well, I guess there's nothing to talk about then."

He shifts back to ice form and walks out the door, slamming it behind him and tramping down the hall.

* * *

**Thanks for all the reviews!**

**So long, so lonely without _Young Justice, _I was in a bad mood (still can't find a job) and snapped at several people today. Then I watched 'Before the Dawn' on YouTube and was happy again for a short while. (M'gann, me and Conner are teaming up for an intervention!) And then I wrote this.**

**Arty's tired all the time now, that's important. And how angry she gets too. The Tigress in the comics seems very angry, lot less controlled alot more gun-ho. (Spells disaster for her and Wally)**

**A bit more comedy for three in the morning. And yes I think this will be more than a three-shot.**

**~QueenVamp**


	3. Angry Words

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **Always Running Out of Time by Motion City  
**Rating: **T  
**Genre: **Romance, Angst, Friendship  
**Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion  
_**Couple: **Artemis/Cameron  
**Inspiration: **last chapter, this song (listen to while writing a college paper), my friends and how we fight

**N/A: **I suck at writing Cameron, but I love Artemis so much and blah blah blah, I bit of fighting in this chapter

**N/A 2:** This is how I act when I'm tired . . . I'm a bitch

* * *

_"I won't tell you how to live your life  
So please stay far away from mine."_

* * *

Why did Alice have to fall down the rabbit hole? Who was stupid enough to lean over a deep shadowed abyss—_destiny be damned!_—and yes the rabbit wearing the waistcoat was cool and everything by what if it was some sort of pedophilic ploy? Why couldn't her parents accept she didn't want to marry and/or whatever and just leave her to her own devices? Artemis had always done her best work alone, without her father or Jade hovering over her like a foreboding threat of a guillotine over her neck like her French ancestors.

In this time, in this Wonderland, she needs to do her best.

Therefore, she needs to be alone.

_But we're not friends Cam._

The words roll off her tongue and poison the ears of those who hear it. Cameron had needed to hear it, needed to know it, needed to believe it so he'd think her cold hearted and leave her alone.

She needed to shove him away, make him want to stay away. She didn't need anyone telling her how to do her job.

And if that meant Cameron sulking around the sub now, pushing every ounce of willpower into ignoring Artemis and keeping her at arm's length, then is was alright because it was the right thing to do.

And she was okay with it.

She knew it was for the best.

But still—.

No, no kill the 'but still', drowned it.

She had to put him out of her mind.

* * *

_"Always watching out for which and when  
Always running out of time."_

* * *

She was going to kill Cameron.

Plan and simple, she would take her bow and shoot an arrow at the soft spot at the back of his neck where his armor was the weakest and then she would take his head as a prize and mount it on her door for all to know not to antagonize Artemis Crock. For she was the daughter of Sportsmaster _and _Huntress and _damn it all _she would _not _stand for anarchy when she couldn't be involved in it!

"Junior," she calls to Cameron's motionless back.

She had been ignoring Cameron and denied his friendship when the only reason he was here was to avenge her death, but when she ignored him in a cool and collected way. She did _not_ act like some high and mighty _five year old. _

"Icicle Junior!"

Tuppence, becoming more peeved by the second bellowed: "JUNIOR, GET YER ASS UP!"

And Cameron's head turned. "I'm sorry, did you say something?"

"Get off the damn boat!"

"Okay."

Maybe she and Tuppence could team up.

* * *

_"Drip drops in like skin of summer  
All once everything unwinds."_

* * *

"Alright boat 'em and float 'em." Artemis calls to the troopers they'd brought to do the heavy lifting and heard someone sniff behind her.

"Oh my God, that's so lame." The comment came, evidently, from Cameron, but still she surprised he's even responding to her. She shrugged off his comment and began to saunter back to the sub where the new teens were being loaded, but Cameron's ice claws snare her shoulder and whirl her around to face him.

Dark blue eyes against coal black ones. It was the glaring match of the century and no one was here to see it.

"What do you think you're doing?" Cameron asks, eyebrows pinching together in irritation.

"My job," she hisses back and places her hands at her hips as if it were a battle position. "And why, aren't you doing yours?"

"Cut the sweet-talk, Art. It's _me. _Remember? _Me_? _Cameron_?" He lays his hands across his chest and his skin flickers from blue to pale white like he was about to phase back to his human form, but he doesn't because he knows where they stand and he knows eyes are always watching.

"I know who you are." She says levelly and Cameron's expression turns to absolute rage.

"Then why are you acting like this?!"

"Me?" she gasps, angered. "Like you're one to talk, you've been ignoring me for two days!"

"Oh! You care now?" Cameron's eyes narrowed. "I needed time to process that the bad girl gone good faked her own death just to go bad again! This whole," he gestures up and down at her. "thing you've got going on seems a bit fishy to me."

He made her want to pull her hair out, but she tried to keep her voice low. "Cameron this doesn't concern you. Just leave it—"

"Well, excuse me, if I'm allergic to bullshit—"

"—I can do whatever I want, Cam. I'm a big girl now—"

"—I call: bullshit."

"Ugh, you're so stupid! That's not even—"

Wrong move. She watched Cameron's expression shatter into a million pieces.

Never, under any circumstances, call Cameron stupid. For all his thick skin was worth the primitive playground insult run him like a knife. Joar had taken him out of school early to give him more time to train. He'd always ask her how school was, what she learned and she'd reply with eye rolling and showing him her heavy textbooks. He missed out on a lot. She'd forgotten that.

But no, at of every insult in all the language she knew, she had to call him stupid.

Maybe she really wasn't his friend.

"Stupid? Stupid? Stupid?! Who are you calling stupid when you signed up for _stupid _escapade?!"

"It's called work. You do it too!"

"I didn't want this!"

"Bullshit!"

"Um, Tigress . . . er, Junior?"

Both turned to face the terrified trooper. "Not now!"

As he stumbled back a few steps towards the sub, he called: "We're about to go under!"

With a final heated glare the two stomped back to the sub. Both reached the entrance at the same time, Cameron—being a 'gentleman'—gestured for her to go first—sarcastically, of course. After another hatful glare, Artemis stepped onto the platform and once again _she slipped. _

Cameron grabbed her elbow. "You know, you really should think about getting some boots with traction."

* * *

_"Inside-out and all about my heart is always running out of time.  
Always running out of time  
Always running out of time."_

* * *

The Team had somehow gotten aboard the ship, that's all she needed to know. And how? She'd gotten the ever loving crap beaten out of her by somone dressed in a trooper uniform and thrown at a _ceiling. _Lucky guess, it was Conner.

M'gann, however, had found Kaldur before Artemis could warn him.

He was broken and crumbled on the ground, motionless like a doll thrown aside.

She knelt beside the ex-hero slowly, feeling the familiar opening as M'gann entered her mind.

_M'gann, what have you done?_

She thought it before she could help it and the Martian's cheery face erupts into a look of hurt. Sobs threatened to fall from her lips and Gareth growls at her, his body puffing outward and taking a different shape and morphing.

By mid-leap: he was a full-grown tiger.

Artemis almost wanted to laugh. _Let's see you do this._

Arm wrapping around Kaldur and then a smoke bomb on her utility belt, she had her escape to the secret door behind them that fell open at the touch of her hand.

* * *

_"I have to know, if you flew away with me  
the faster I go the further away it seems we get  
And floating our way out."_

* * *

Kaldur still hadn't awoken, but Black Manta had made no secret that he was furious about the League's sudden drop on them and taking nearly half of their supply for the experimentees. As it turns out; the next generation Team hadn't taken too lightly on the fact that teenagers were being abducted. Though part of her was damn proud someone was doing something about this, she also wanted to march herself over to Bludhaven and trash Dick's apartment.

Why had M'gann _done that_?!

How had M'gann _done that_?!

Sure, she'd seen Kaldur kill Artemis, but she knew Kaldur. She knew Kaldur couldn't possibly be capable of such evil? Had it been the other way around . . .

"I would have darted you to a wall." Artemis whispers to Kaldur's unconscious body after the healers have gone. The truth in her words couldn't have held as much venom, but she knew that if had it been the other way around, and M'gann faked her own death at Kaldur's hands she would have slipped and fallen from every good grace that separate her from Jade. She would fought for the privilege of killing him from _Conner_—or that L'gann or whomever she was with now—and _Martian Manhunter_.

Hell, she wouldn't mind double teaming as long as she got to lose a few arrows and cut through his dense Atlantian skin.

_Stop. _She warned herself. _Don't think that way, no._

Her mask lay on her lap as she bent over with her fingers in her unnatural black hair.

_I need to get a head on my shoulders. I can't lose to them._

Keep a façade. Keep a mask.

She lays her head beside Kaldur's shoulder on the bed, but doesn't sleep, just dreams of unsettling blood splattered things.

God, she needed to get some sleep.

* * *

**I imagine the trooper that ran was really Dick in disguise.**

**Sorry this is a week late, Halloween was last week and I've been fan-girling about TVD (Klaroline Forever!) and fighting for Proclamation 37 in California to get GMOs labeled on food (if you live in the area and you see comercials of farmers saying it will take their money DON'T Believe THEM they are paid actors) because if farmers shouldn't have to pay people in other countries to regather and replant their seeds (they've been literally killing themselves over it).**

**N-O, G-M-O! *It can cause forms of cancer and was not tested safe to eat, and the COke company had invested a big enough wad, that could possibly make a dent in getting at America out of debt, just to keep mouths shut about it. I'm telling you this needs to go viral.**

**Funny story today: I was driving around Micky D's (gross I know, but I wanted coffee and since I'm a high school student without a job I had a cupon) and I went around to find out that _YOUNG JUSTICE _is the new Happy Meal toy. They probably don't have Cameron or Jade but I want to collect them all! Muahaha!**

**Alright, that's it,**

**Loves and reviews,**

**~QueenVamp**


	4. Going Down

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **"Alice" by Avril Lavigne **  
Rating: **T **  
Genre: **Romance, Angst, Friendship**  
Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion_**  
Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt**  
Inspiration: **Last chapter, wanting to break away, fan-girling

**N/A: **California lost, but I'm not going to take this. I've raised too much money and done too much already to back down now.

* * *

_"Tripping out, spinning around  
I'm underground, I fell down.  
Yeah, I fell down."_

* * *

Dreams were twirling hand-and-hand with nightmares. Slipping and sliding across the oil black backdrop of dead bodies and her friends. Unmasked and exposed, beaten to a bloody pump, bones broken and left open and raw for the pickings of vultures. Like Tula and Jason . . . oh god, she had become them.

She was there when they were buried and locked away in boxes like dark secrets never to be mentioned again.

Would they do that same with her?

"Artemis?"

Lock her away and never breathe her name again?

"Hey, Mis? Artemis, wake up. C'mon."

She whimpers but forces her eyes open all the same to find Cam's human face and anime-boy pretty crystal blues staring back at her with concern.

"Hey," a cool hand touches the side of her face that's not pressed against Kaldur's bed. "You were having a nightmare."

She stares back at him silently and glances up at Kaldur's vitals before leaning up to rub the sleep from her eyes. Her head feels heavy. "Oh," is about all she can manage.

"Here," Cameron hands her two Aspirin and a small paper cup full of water and she glances up at him questioningly before he rebuts and falls back into his boy brain. "You look like hell."

There's her once-but-not-anymore-best friend.

"Thanks Cam," she says dryly and chases the pills down with water. She glances at Kaldur's sleeping stupor and wonders if anyone has been in yet to check on him. There are no visible clocks in the room, or really anywhere on the sub, so Artemis had been judging time by looking out the portholes of the sub to weight the choices of light blue water or dark blue water.

Another thing—there were no portholes in here either.

She looks up at Cameron who's watching her expectantly.

"What?" she nearly growls.

"Nothin'." Cameron feigns innocence and diverts his gaze for a moment.

"Screw nothing. _What's wrong now_?" Her voice is dripping acidically at every syllable.

* * *

_ "I'm freaking out, where am I now?  
I'm underground and I can't stop it now."_

* * *

Kaldur's still not waking up and Artemis is becoming more and more anxious by the day, pacing the floors, hovering the doctors and questioning to Black Manta on the merits of Atlantian healers. That only got her a few quaint 'lover-girl' nicknames but she wasn't giving up—growing agitation aside.

Life was becoming a mosquito bite that had contacted West Nile.

A buggering annoyance like the boy of ice who noticeably began to chill the very rooms he walks into.

* * *

_"You can't stop me now."_

* * *

Cameron was always the sort to get troubling things off his chest as soon as possible. Like his words and emotions were ugly leftover vegetables no one wanted, she was the garbage disposal.

"So, do you want to explain? Why'd you go straight?"

"Because my mom—"

"Then switch back over again? Was it for him?" Cameron was pointing at the motionless Kaldur on the bed.

"No! No it wasn't!"

"Then _why_?!"

"I CAN'T TELL YOU OKAY! ?"

Now, she was backed up and spitting the remains out until he got a new one.

* * *

_"I, I'll get by. I, I'll survive."_

* * *

She's staring at her reflection in the mirror and seeing the same face Kaldur and Wally and Dick and now, possibly, M'gann can only see.

Her features have always been odd. Asian and blonde. That was a big oxymoron for you, and a genetic abnormality that had been many times explained to her through the magical possibilities of Punnet Squares that had something to do with recessive and dominate traits in her gene pool.

Blonde hair versus black hair. Darker shades and tones were said to be more dominate, like they could swallow the trait whole like when a baby is first born with blonde hair that progressively turns darker, or blue eyes that progressively go green or sometimes darker.

Then again, she had retained the blonde hair/blue eye combo from her father, so was it really even a surprise?

Paula had once been astounded but Artemis's coloring and had snapped about a half a million photos of her before she was shipped off to prison and Lawrence wasn't really the type to be as sentimental about pictures when what he wanted to see was right in front of him.

The happy little baby, toddler then steadily growing child remained in the past, in the pictures where she belonged.

* * *

_"When the world's crashing down  
When I'm falling, hit the ground  
Don't you try and stop me."_

* * *

She's in the infirmary again and when Cameron finds her—like always when the writer is obviously about to end a damn chapter—he has something to say.

He begins with small talk, asking how she is, how Kaldur is and briefly updates her on the behaviors of the Terror twins and how Tuppence is still evading him and now Tommy decided to step in. " . . . so after he finished threatening me, I decided to come see you—and Artemis I'm sorry so will you just forgive me already! ?"

She, having barely been listening, stares at him in shock when his monotonous voice breaks its pattern to snap and apology at her.

"For what?" ash asks.

He's in his human form and, due to his pale parlor, goes ruddy red at the cheeks. "Well, you're mad at me for two reasons: one) because I refuse to leave you alone—and _no _this doesn't mean I'm _going to_—and two) you're friend/boyfriend/what_ever _is in comatose and I should have known better than to pick a fight with you."

He's right, and direct, and as usual knows her moods, but still: "I'm not mad at you Cameron."

She really has to stop using his name.

Cameron pulls his don't-feed-me-that-bullshit face and Artemis frowns.

"I'm not mad at you Cameron, but I really just can't talk to you."

Cameron glares. "Because we use to know each other? Well, that's bull. We can pretend just to be fast friends—unless you're going for the 'untouchable seductress prude' in that getup I could start hitting on you and you could give me feedback on my lines when we're alone."

"We can't be friends. Period."

"Why?" Cameron asks tartly like something sour was in his mouth. "Why are you dressed like that anyways? Why did you really fake your death and change your face if it wasn't for him?"

Seeing him edge closer to the truth, Artemis lashed out.

"Get. Out." She spits and Cameron glares at her sensing her tension, but this time, he's not backing down.

* * *

**Kaldur's script description was to lay there and be catotonic like Betty Parris from "The Crucible" THAT PLAY IS MEANT TO BE SEEN AND NOT READ. ARTHUR MILLER DID NOT WRITE NOVELS and he wasn't accused of beign in cahoots with communists just so everyone could hate his work in the end *pout* Though it was amazing he married to Marilyn Monroe. My English teacher is very spirited this year, she says we should read "Fifty Shades of Gray" instead, but since we can't legally we do it anyway. It's anatomy the fun way XD (I have to quote her: "Smut! Let's all read smut! Look at Callie over there, in her chair desk with Christian Gray, she reading that book like its a war!" Callie's a girl in my class)**

**Anyway, catotonic, funny. And Artemis, well she's falling and slipping and dreaming and oh my goddess she's becoming an Alice and Camron's her White Rabbit.**

**In other news: I'm writing a new Cam/Art story. You can look on my pole on my homepage for it, it's called "Can't Catch Me"**

**Loves and reviews,**

**~QueenVamp**


	5. Salt Blue

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **"Sea What We Sea" by Never Shout Never**  
Rating: **T **  
Genre: **Romance, Angst, Friendship**  
Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion_**  
Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt**  
Inspiration: **Cam needed to yell

**N/A: **Sorry this took so long, I've been . . . around. SO Happy Holidays!

* * *

_"I got sunshine on a cloudy day."_

* * *

In her wonderland there were smooth talking cats with deadly knives and nails to match, there were knights that sought to kill her, and knights that repented by not killing her, yet. Tagging along were boys with pretty blue eyes and hands that could crush rocks into fine grained dust, green skinned girls who baked cakes dotted with frosting petals and could seriously fuck up your mind, and acrobats who could flip and twirl and bend nearly anyway they will, then bend you to theirs.

But among all these dazzlingly irrational people there was a boy who, when he touched her, if he touched her, could freeze her skin and chill the warmth from her bones with a smooth, careless caress that would leave her skin cool and gently pink with nips of frost shadowing the length of his touch.

He was Cameron, and he was her White Rabbit.

* * *

_"Got a lovely little lamp inside my brain."_

* * *

"You can_not _be serious!" she shrieks.

Cameron is icing over the door—lock, cracks, all of it—and making it impossible for her to escape. His hand which was morphed into a half-ice, half-flesh structure, rests at his side and he turns to face her, wicked eyebrows pulled together angrily.

"Oh I'm _dead _serious!"

"Let me out!"

"Well, when you—no."

"Cam!"

"You know what will make me un-ice the door? Huh? Tell me the truth, ya whimp!"

Artemis's mouth opened and closed like a fish for a few moments. "Cam!"

"What!?"

"Do you seriously think calling me names will help?"

"Don't ask me stupid questions, Blondie!"

"Argh! Cameron!"

* * *

_ "I've got you and me; that's a family."_

* * *

Artemis could spend a year with someone, anyone, and in during that year she would spend every waking moment from day break to twilight with them and wherever they go, but when a significant day—holiday or birthday—came around on the infinite turning of the Earth, she would be completely stumped on what to get them. Her mind would frantically claw: what was their favorite movie? candy? nut allergy? socks?

This wasn't because she wasn't observant by any means, she was a grade-A pavement artist and could tell you what shirt you were wearing last time they saw each other two weeks ago, but again that wasn't the point.

When she looked at rows of possible gifts—varying in size, shape, color, and brand—and she'd hit a block.

What _did _they want?

She didn't know.

Because she didn't know _them._

And no one knew _her._

She never let that happen.

Many times before, she recruited Dick out for a shopping trip for Wally's birthday and Christmas gifts and ever year she would be awestruck as the acrobat would survey the inventory before pointing and saying "that one" and then tie it to something Wally said about this or that and Artemis would push down the knots in her stomach and say Dick made a better girlfriend than she did.

Dick would then, in turn, huff and raise his eyebrows in muse before mentioning his previous red hair fetish, but that his bi-curiosity had been stifled after a freshman college orientation gone wrong, she'd leave it at that and they'd continue in silence.

Then she passed a shelf of blue salt-water taffy and she'd think of the one person who'd _love _to have some, but wasn't on her shopping list.

* * *

_"Let's sail the seven seas  
and see what we see."_

* * *

When they were kids, mere assassins in trailing who were still learning their automatics from their semiautomatics, there was a sweet old woman who lived across the great asphalt divide of road, guarded by monstrous semi-trucks and rich kid cars under the radar of police scanners, from Cameron's old house near the west most edge of Gotham were cement turned to grass and grass turned to weeds.

The old lady was tiny and wrinkled, but she always had a little upward curved smile that deepened the furrows in her skin and squinted eyes.

She scared Artemis senseless, but Cameron adored her enough to dub her Grandma Rosie.

Eventually, she came around to sitting in Grandma Rosie's dusty little sitting room a foot or two away from Cam at all times while he stuck to the woman's hip and told her about his day and the people he'd seen and how stubborn and manly Artemis was.

She dubbed a seal of approval on Grandma Rosie too when the woman batted his nose with a spoon and made him apologize for speaking badly of a lady.

Grandma Rosie had two teeth—both her wisdom if you could believe it—for all of her others had rotted away and she couldn't pay to get false ones so everything she ate was pre-chewed slush that reminded her of baby food. The only normal thing she ate was salt water taffy that she would crush between her gums—she made the mistake of giving one to Cam once and he was hooked.

He ate that taffy until his tongue, and lips, turned blue, until the wax feel of the wrappers rubbed off on his fingers and the smell was pungent in his breath.

When he first kissed her—age twelve, in the dark of a pillow fort—his lips were sticky and blue and before she could make a cry of outrage he popped a candy into her mouth and kissed her temple sweetly.

Every day, he went over to Grandma Rosie's for more candy and chats and the _normal _feeling the old woman provided.

On the one day he didn't come, the old woman came to him—or tried to.

It was a monstrous semi made she sure hadn't reached her destination.

* * *

_"'Cause life is silly if you see like me."_

* * *

After that Artemis gathered up an money she could and bought the biggest bag of salt water taffy she could find and rushed over to Cam's house to find him red faced and sobbing; he took one look at her and cried that she bought green not blue before pulling her into a hug and staining her shirt.

Cameron had to be the only person she knew like the back of her hand.

And that was okay because Cameron had to be the only person who knew her better than she knew herself.

* * *

_"So please don't take life so seriously."_

* * *

"Oh no, kitty cat, you're tellin' me what's going on first." Cameron's arms curl over each other and, for a moment, he looks like an enraged mother asking her daughter why she missed curfew. She quick shakes the thought away and rubs her heavy eyes before pushing herself to stand.

"Cam, please,"

"Artemis, no. I'm _done _with this. Give me one good reason why I shouldn't tell your father that you're alive. It's no skin off my teeth; if I do maybe Jade will stop cornering me in every alley for a place on the team."

She squirms and Cameron's still glaring.

"Artemis, they're you're family."

". . ."

"Don't you dare pull that 'I don't need them, they don't need me'; they at least deserve to know you're alive!"

"Oh yeah?" she huffed. "What about all those years when they left me, huh? I was locked in our apartment for _weeks _not knowing if my dad or Jade were _alive _and—!"

Cameron cut her bravado short.

"Pssh, yeah right. _You _were the one reassuring _me _they were alright. If I even said anything thing you'd clock me in the head and say, 'I'll tell Daddy you said that and he'll put a javelin up you're—!'"

"_I _was still scared!" she screams back at him. "I was faking it!"

"And so are they!"

Artemis stared back at her friend, obviously tired and perhaps a little more sleep deprived than her, but not willing to relent.

"I can't." She was surprised to hear herself sounding so weak. "Don't you understand that I can't?"

"Artemis, trust me!"

"I can't do that either!"

"Why not?" Cameron threw his hands in the air. Last time she saw him, if he had made that gesture he would have iced her without even meaning too, but now he was older, more in control, powerful even. "Just because I'm on the other side? I'm not on the other side anymore, Art. We're the same! We don't have to ignore each other anymore!"

Artemis's heart began to climb into her throat.

Had Cameron really missed her that much? She hadn't even—

"But we're not, Cam."

Blue eyes widened and Cameron's voice creased in his throat.

"We're never on the same side."

* * *

**I can't go out of character. She can't say why yet . . . next chapter. Kaldur is still catatonic. He dead. alive really, but you know what I mean.**

**Loves and reviews,**

**~QueenVamp**


	6. White Lie

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **"In Transit" by Mark Hoppus feat. Pete Wentz**  
Rating: **T **  
Genre: **Romance, Angst, Friendship**  
Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion_**  
Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt**  
Inspiration: **God, I just needed a little loving.

**N/A: **I saw _Rise of the Guardians . . . _and somehow, not sure how, got the download to watch it repeatedly over the past few days. WriteOnForever you were right, Jack does remind me of Cameron (not completely) but during the movie I was freaking outlike a squealy little fangirl. New favorite movie!

**N/A2: **Bad thing to say in a genre catagory Romance movie but I love songs and books and movies that aren't revolved around love. Character development goddamnit! People can grow on their own! Not off each other! . . . how I became this is a long, mean-girl story.

* * *

_"The world is filled with  
the minds of people who will try to discuss."_

* * *

People lied on a daily bases, it was just human nature. Even the most innocent little white lies about Santa Claus, or the Easter Bunny, or the Tooth Fairy—little things, things to give children a leg up on imagination and something fun to look forward to every passing holiday. They were white lies, the tiny things that saved people from disappointment in life and kept them safe.

She had been spared white lies all her life; everything was such a bitter swelling wound of truth that lies are her keepsake.

She lies to the Team to her mom to her professors and to Wally; and she feels nothing because they're white lies and they don't even matter to be honest.

But for some strange reason lying to Cameron feels wrong. Really wrong.

Both of them were surrounded by truth, and they can't take the lies.

* * *

_"A light will; shine through  
When no one can save you."_

* * *

Cameron's staring at her and his brows are knit together, puzzled until finally they smooth out and the words fall from his lips slow and deliberate like he can't believe he hadn't thought of it before. "You're under cover aren't you?"

His expression is twisting and his head tilts to the side like a different view point might help him understand, but he's still looking at her was the same pitifully hurt, kicked puppy expression that is endless etched into his features whenever he looks at her.

"You just keep twisting that knife don't you?"

If he had a grip on her heart right now, he wouldn't even have to squeeze, it was caving in all on its own.

Cameron's lips twitched and Artemis downcast her gaze because she doesn't deserve to look him in the eye.

"I just wanted to help you . . ."

* * *

_"And you feel, the eyes of people who try to decide."_

* * *

Why couldn't she have just lied to Cameron?

Why did he have to find her out?

Why couldn't he have just left it alone?

Why did he have to think so highly of her when she was nothing but terrible to him?

It only hurt him in the end, so _why_?

* * *

_"You'll find yourself lost, inside of the chaos."_

* * *

She thinks she knows the reason. For all of the above.

A pact they made as children that held them together through the worst of times.

"You're with me—"

"And I'm with you—"

"And in this world that's more than enough—"

"Better than food on the table—"

"Better than any diabolical plot—"

"Better than arrows —"

"Better than ice—"

"And will always be this way." The cuddled close in the alley way and they were each other's shelter for the night. They're own safe haven.

* * *

_"The truth is never far away  
You always give yourself away."_

* * *

"Cam—ron, Cameron," she whispers but she doesn't know why.

He won't even look at her and his head is bowed to the door, breaking away the ice that covers it and with every punch he sends to the wall the noise makes a shattering sound that reverberates off the walls like breaking glass and all she can feel is this overwhelming _guilt _so thick that it feels like her hands will never be clean of it.

"Cameron," her whispers fall on depth ears, swallowed up by the echoing noise of the room.

He's still beating at the door with everything he has left in him and his punches are increasing with each second and his teeth are now gridded like he wishes he hadn't even tried.

"Cameron,"

She used to tease him for having a unisex name, and would often call him Cammie just to piss him off, but Cameron always sounded better. He was Cameron and he was the only on in the world allowed to have that name and it shined with a sort of indifference that was striking to her.

"Cameron . . ." Her voice tangoing with some deeper human impulse that she could never rid her of and she's choking on his name with the sheer lack of air in her lungs.

"What?"

She goes still and realizes the breaking glass is gone and he is staring at her with a shocked expression like he's witnessing firsthand the eighth wonder of the world.

Something warm and wet slips down her cheeks and she chokes on a breath the size of a watermelon and she gasps at the visible blow it sends to her lungs.

Maybe this is the eighth wonder.

* * *

_"Through open eye, its slide of him  
Won't you reveal to me?"_

* * *

Somehow crying turns to sobbing and sobbing transits to hysteria and Cameron is holding her to him and he's cold and warm and solid and there and she can't uncurl her fingers from the back of his shirt and he doesn't seem to be willing to let her go either.

Her head hurts and she can't remember why she's crying.

Why is Cameron holding her?

It doesn't matter, she doesn't want to move.

Cameron's fingers run through her hair and she's rubbing his back, feeling his shoulders shake a little too.

* * *

_"Reveal to me . . ."_

* * *

They sit up for the rest of the night and she answers questions as vaguely as she can. Cameron's eyes are on the choker at her throat and his finger reach up—_cool and curious—_to tap at the jewel that weights her neck like an anchor.

His fingers slip over the surface-wise delicate, velvet on her neck and slides to the back where the iron clasp keeps it firmly held aground her swanlike neck. Dick also knew how to pick out jewelry too, especially steel enforced will-not-break and magically-voodoo jewelry.

His nail taps that clasp and she grabs his wrist, halting him.

"Cam,"

He nods and rests his head against her shoulder like a weight was lifted from his shoulders.

"I missed you Artemis."

She leans back against the wall their sitting against and laces her fingers with his.

"I missed you too."

It wasn't until later, that she thought about Wally.

* * *

**I'm living in the mind-set where I can say "screw you!" to all problems and enjoy my life. You know why? New Year's is tomorrow and it's party time! Hell yeah! My hands are shaking and I just ate (no joke) a whole bar of organic Fair Trade chocolate my teacher gave me for the holidays. **

**Life is good . . . except Artemis/Cameron/Wally thing I just started. Oh dear, this will be fun. **

**Loves and reviews,**

**~QueenVamp**


	7. So Far

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **"Who Are You Really" By Mikky Echo**  
Rating: **T **  
Genre: **Romance, Angst, Friendship**  
Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion_**  
Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt**  
Inspiration: **Teen Wolf

**Note: **sorry for the wait, a tad bit of writer's bloke and some other stories came up out of nowhere.

**Note 2: **i've been using the soundtrack to the 2012 _Alice in Wonderland _movie for this, check all the songs, but this one isn't from the soundtrack, but I listened to it and it just fit too, too perfectly.

* * *

_"So you feel entitled to a sense of control  
And make decisions that you think are your own."_

* * *

The sub is becoming a place where time and space do not affect this underwater arsenal of hell. She can't follow the time, the days, the weeks, has it been months? She has to guess at them—or check her digital watch. That always seems to work.

She's been undercover for months, cramped into another body, another life and the strain is beginning to wear on her. Asking herself daily a platoon of questions that make no sense and trying to piece together how everything got so bad this fast.

Cameron is there, of course, talking about the old days—and really the old days seem to be the only thing that makes sense nowadays. This is who she would have become without the Justice League: a villainess, a huntress, a member of the Shadows; going on missions like assassinating the ambassadors of Relasia with her sister and robbing banks with Cam. Bringing home big money and buying the latest gadgets and moving from place to place to place three of five times a month.

But she wasn't that person anymore.

Is she?

Who is she? Who is she really?

What is she capable of in this new her?

* * *

_"You are a stranger here, why have you come  
Why have you come, lift me higher, let me look at the sun"_

* * *

Psimon shouldn't be allowed in here.

Having spent the better part of two weeks hovering over Kaldur's bed like a doting mother whilst Black Manta searches far and wide like a dedicated father, Artemis was not about to let someone as untrustworthy and downright creepy as Psimon—who _has _been in their minds before—probing around in Kaldur's defenseless subconscious.

_He has powers._

But that doesn't mean he can beat her, Daddy taught her that.

Artemis was sure if she could just slap a collar around his neck, she could make him wish he never set foot on this sub. In a very personal way.

But she has to remember that she's back in her old world now. All fighting—personal, tactical and other—has to be done with a delicacy as one would treat a newborn baby.

In other words: if she has to kill Psimon, she better have the best plan imaginable.

* * *

_"Look at the sun and once I hear them clearly say  
Who, who are you really? And where are you going?"_

* * *

In the end, it's her father that saves her—_which by definition is a particularly cruel twist of fate_—more so, it's the toxin he made, but she managed to replicate. Cameron had told her about his attempts to get to Kaldur, to erect revenge for the death of his daughter, who was executed without his permission.

She scoffs and Cam sighs because they both know he's not fooling anyone.

Sportsmaster still cares about her, and that scares him because he can't hide it.

He tried that with her mother—_she had watched him try to pretend that he didn't care, Paula was nothing to him, she was his wife, but he played her for a fool—_and she saw his façade, his mask, his very shield that kept all others out, crack that day she came home in her wheelchair.

But her father has many masks, and one when breaks, he'll make another.

Paula had been Lawrence's sole focus, his love, his life, his way, his partner in crime.

When she was gone, Artemis had become her substitute and was trained to be so.

Now that she's gone, she wonders if Jade is getting her chance to show just how she is just as strong and resilient, and independent, and family oriented, and drivenas he is.

* * *

_"Well I've got nothing left to prove  
Cause I've got nothing left to lose."_

* * *

Black Manta believes her lies easily and Psimon is—as of right now—a threat on the Light's watch list and while they hand over his catatonic body to Prince Orm, Artemis kisses good-bye what may be her only chance to save Kaldur without the League's involvement.

Original plan to let Psimon heal him and _then _knock him out? Yeah, that didn't work and she has the bruises to prove it.

Cam's hands worked as perfect ice-pack substitutes while she relays her new plan off to Black Manta, and the idea of kidnapping Miss Martian is a good one, stupid, but they're only chance since he now thinks M'gann has poisoned his mind to all who enters as well.

"I will take small team to go with me ashore."

"No," Black Manta steps aside to reveal a man in an orange and grey ensemble. "Take Deathstoke with you."

"Perfect."

_Perfect._

* * *

_"See me bare my teeth for you"  
_

* * *

{_Artemis that is _you _isn't it?_}

M'gann's plea sounds odd to her ears. She hasn't heard it in forever and the intrusion of her mind feels like someone is pulling back the wallpaper of her concentration, peaking into her most private thoughts and laying them out like cards on a table.

She builds steel walls around herself and nods.

_It's me M'gann. _She levels her crossbow, already loaded with a new flashing bolt to stun her. _I'm here to kidnap you. _

* * *

_"Who are you?"_

* * *

It was easy to take out M'gann.

She held nothing back and just attacked—like the very first time. Adrenaline pumped through her veins, fierce and sharp, making every color brighter and every sting of pain sweeter. Rolling in her stomach and boiling in her blood, the metallic taste rose to her tongue when she landed the drop on her friend.

And although M'gann had been pulling back—although her mind had been shrieking with terror—Artemis had felt like she was on the hunt.

* * *

_"Now you're moving on and then you say you're alone  
Suspicious that this string is moving your bones."_

* * *

"Tigress, a word?" Black Manta holds open the door for her as they step into the hall—_you could tell a lot about a man on how he treats a lady; knowing if it's all a façade or not, however, is another test entirely—_and shuts the door behind them. Cameron is standing in the hall; ice manipulated into a defensive layer that bands tightly around his arms to make himself look bigger as they cross over his chest nonchalantly, and calmly watches the scene unfold in front of him.

She keeps her eyes on Black Manta, who was acting every bit of a worried parent that Sportsmaster never was. _Does that make him stronger? Or weaker? _Cameron and her might have benefitted on his brand of parenting. Not the flat out abandonment, but the fierce love and gentle guidance.

Then again, they wouldn't be themselves without their own messed-up fathers.

"I'll keep an eye on her; I won't let her hurt Kaldur'ahm." She vows and she knows it's true and every fiber of her being is alight with a savage rush of adrenaline that she can reign and use to her advantage, like M'gann really was a threat.

But she's not, and while in her heart she knows that, her mind is veering into different waters.

* * *

_"We are the fire we see how they run  
See how they run, lift me higher, let me look at the sun."_

* * *

"You okay?" Cam asks, not verbally, but his expression says it all, and she knows that without the cameras she may have thrown herself into his arms then and there, but Deathstroke and who knows who else, is watching so she smiles with her eyes and gestures for him to follow her back into Kaldur's room.

"We've found a method of treatment that will allow the Martian to enter Kaldur'ahm's mind and piece back together all that has been broken by her. I shall need you on the side lines with me to be sure that she does not go back on her word." She says in a clipped no-nonsense voice that Cameron responses to with a peevish nod.

Cameron smiles and M'gann's eyes go wide with panic.

"Hey cutie, haven't seen you in a while. Nice necklace."

_Artemis? What's he doing here?!_

Composing herself and taking a breath, she answers: _He's a friend._

* * *

**I seriously thought Artemis might try to kill Psimon, but she did something nontheless and I expected her to and then she started talking and it set the perfect mood for my chapter that took me so long to write. yay. Anyone else ticked at the show? Jaime and the Beetle, Lex Luthur and all the other REACH stuff makes me want to bash my head into my keyboard. It's three in the morning. I love you all.**

**Review and more Frostbite next chap.**


	8. blood deep

**Title: **Alice the Tiger  
**Song: **"Never Let Me Go" by Florence and the Machine**  
Rating: **T **  
Genre: **Romance, Angst, Friendship**  
Fandom: **_Young Justice: Invasion_**  
Couple: **Artemis/Cameron, Article Jr., Frostbite, CamArt**  
Inspiration: **

**Note: **i got trapped in this matrix called 'school' surrounded by these foes called 'finals'. if i can write an autobiography about it it would be an amazing rom-action movie.

* * *

_"looking up from underneath fracture moonlight on the sea, reflections still look the same to me—  
as before I went under—"_

* * *

Her family's legacy is smash and grab, steal and plunder, duck and hide. They lived the lifestyle of the forty thieves for years, playing modern Robin Hoods with one-hundred percent of the profits. But with their business, medical bills, and safe house payments: money ran out fast. Her family even more so.

Her parents were the best, and could have been better if Paula never got pregnant—twice. They were the children that were never meant to be, the ones that were never wanted, but Paula tried her hardest to make them feel wanted and Lawrence tried his hardest to support them all.

Their parents were the ones everyone called, they worked all over, but very rarely did Paula allow Artemis or her sister even a glimpse into their world. It was too dangerous for them being children.

Jade learnt by association. She was the top gymnast in their low-fund school, she was smart, she could snatch wallets faster than their mother, and she had the best poker face Artemis had ever seen to date. The only time she could truly see what her sister was thinking was when she would rarely let her carefully placed mask peel back like a bandage covering damaged skin. Artemis had seen past it when Jade told Artemis she was pregnant. She was scared. She needed help. For the first time in ever, her sister needed her. And Artemis didn't disappoint.

They went to the Master together and bribed for freedom. She never told Wally; to this day he still thought she was staying after for classes. She felt nothing throwing her duffle into the car, hiding it beneath the seat, and turning to kiss Wally on the lips and throw a remark about him remember to take the trash out after she left. She felt nothing driving up to meet Jade and pulling on her own armor to protect herself.

Master was calm and generous as he could be without favoritism, but stoic like a warrior.

"I will give Jade Nguyen the freedom she so wants if you can do something for me." He offered and brought forward a squirming man with his mouth taped and his hands bound. He was dirty and bruised, built like a warrior and holding himself like a child. "Kill him for me, as the last request."

Jade was already pulling her Sai from her belt when Master stopped her.

"Not you," he said and his eyes roll in their sockets to fix on Artemis. "You. How far will you go Hero—to save your sister?"

* * *

_"and it's peaceful in the deep, cathedral where you cannot breathe,"_

* * *

Cameron unnerves M'gann. She can see that with every glance M'gann sends him and how her voice quivers when she speaks, but M'gann is strong and resilient. She leans over Kaldur's catatonic form and pretends to be healing what's already been fixed and tartly snaps through her mind that she doesn't trust Cameron. She was the ability to look into minds and find the answers herself, but she won't trust him.

Artemis frowns. _M'gann, you have to _trust me_ with this one. Cameron won't hurt us._

{I_ know, that's what _you _think, but_ I,}her expression is pained for a few moments. {_I just don't._}

_You know, I can hear you, right? _Cameron asks.

{_Get out_!} M'gann snaps and Artemis could practically feel the mental push M'gann gives him out of their minds. Cameron actually stumbles a little.

"Icicle Junior?" she asks, finding it hard to wrap her tongue around the name. Cameron gives her a look that says she reacted well and nods, acting annoyed.

"Fine, I'm gonna get some coffee. Will you be alright with the prisoner?" he asks and Artemis wants to dig her teeth into her lip, worrying it to bleed.

He's giving them time to talk—and putting his position in danger.

She glares at M'gann with real, red, furious anger for a moment before turning back to Cameron. "She's nothing I can't handle." She says as coolly as she can and hopes M'gann feels terrible for endangering him for even a second.

He nods and leaves, and Artemis returns to glaring. _Did you really have to do that? We're _all _on thin ice here._

{_No pun intended?_}M'gann raises a brow and Artemis moves her hands to her hips. {_I'm sorry—it's just . . . how do you know he's on our side? You said he was a friend, but I'm having trouble believing that_.}

Artemis pauses, biting the inside of her cheek. _We knew each other before._

{_Before all this? Yeah, we all did. The guys put him in jail and Conner and I visited_.}

_So did I_, Artemis thought back to the last time she and Cam saw each other in the juvenile detention center, wearing their orange jumpsuits and staring into the foggy grey windows realizing they'd grown up to be exactly what their fathers wanted them to be. They'd joked; of course, they couldn't let themselves feel guilty about any of it. Not a bit. Cam even tried to get her in on the heist. He was the weak link that talked to the girl skimming the edge of the circle. _We're childhood friends. We knew each other before any of this. _

* * *

_"no need to pray, no need to speak  
now i am under,"_

* * *

Days pass, Black Manta's hope is invested into M'gann's healing capabilities and Deathstroke is monitoring there every move over the newly installed camera lingering in a no blind spot corner in Kaldur's room. They're safe, just barely. Cameron stays in the corner of the room closest to the door, outside of the mind-link between them, watching their unmoving forms with vacant eyes. M'gann's still uneasy and shares her thoughts with Artemis.

{_I think he'll turn against us_.}

_And I think he won't._

{_What about Wally?}_ M'gann asks and her eyes are shining with fatigue and question. Artemis stares at her a moment, trying to piece everything together herself. What about Wally? How was he even in this conversation? How was he—oh.

_You think . . . ?_ She tries to keep her face neutral for the camera's sake and her mind blank for M'gann's.

{_Artemis, I can see into his mind. He's here because he thought you were dead and you're not now_,} M'gann pauses as if weighing if she really wants to say what she had to say next. {_He likes you_.}

When she's alone in her room, she tortures herself with thoughts of Wally and how she hasn't really thought about her boyfriend of five years in a while.

Vividly in her mind, she knows what he looks like—_red hair, green eyes, smiles_—but the image is also fading in brightness like it had been left out in the sun too long. The mischievous sparkle in his eye isn't there, the unseen freckles that splatter across the pale skin of his nose and behind his ears, and the bite-marks on his thumb he always chews on.

She remembers them, but can't place them.

Wally is Wally and will always be Wally.

Her mirror is cracked under her palms and while she stares at the broken image of herself—_blonde hair, grey eyes, scared_—she wonders if she might not always be Artemis.

* * *

_"oh and it's breaking over me, a thousand miles down to the sea bed  
i found a place to rest my head,"_

* * *

She enters Kaldur's mind and helps him piece it back together again, mourning over the broken terrains of Atlantis that make up Tula and the blue waters of his childhood, to the deep reefs of his fears and resentments, to the great pillars of his fragmented thoughts and plans for the future. The most basic things she stumbles on, Kaldur's favorite things like colors and foods are rocks that need to be placed back accordingly or else whilst trying to solve what 2 + 2 equals, he's mind will wander thinking the answer is fish, or something correspondingly weird.

"I think your father really does care about you." She says one day while helping the reconstruction of a pillar. She's happy to talk to him again, after weeks of being in the blind and the unexpected turns, she's glad that the leader she followed so fearlessly for years is back.

"So do I," he says. "But he'd sooner turn against me if he knew my true plans. Our relationship is cemented by a neutral want for destruction—of which I have no plans in further investing in after the mission is complete." He pieces back the last of the smooth white stone and it shines, illuminated. Kaldur's eyes shine with the memory. "Ah, yes our first mission as a team when we came across your sister."

Artemis smiles fondly, "Yeah, Jade cut you up pretty bad didn't she?"

"Nothing that didn't heal with time," He reassures and they move on to the next one. "Have you spoken with her recently?"

"Before faking my own death? Yeah, I told her I couldn't babysit for her."

"You miss your niece and sister?"

"Of course," Artemis says unabashed while her mind lingers on what she had to do to let her niece have her first breath. She was as devoted to her as Jade was, more so than Roy. But Jade was hell-bent on giving her daughter a fighting chance at a normal life, so accepting him into the family was not a topic for discussion. Not that she, or their mother, mind all that much: Roy is a wonderful father, and he loves Lian almost as much as she does, but she can't shake the fact that he's still looking for the 'real Roy Harper'. It wasn't healthy.

He didn't sacrifice the way she or Jade did.

"And others from your past as well?" Kaldur asks and Artemis whirls to look at him.

"You've talked to M'gann?"

"Yes."

"Then you know about Cameron."

"Yes and I must ask you why to choose to sympathize and share our secrets with Icicle Junior. Even more so, how did he find out? I know you well enough that you would never jeopardize a mission of this caliber."

Jeopardize sends a hail of shivers down her back.

Artemis bites at her lip. "I didn't share our secrets. And I'm not sympathizing. He found out on his own. He knows me in a way you guys—he's my friend, Kaldur. For a long time he was the only family I had." She says and tries, tries, tries to stay strong.

"Then he shouldn't have—"

"Not all of us got the same chances I did." She snaps quickly in Cam's defense. "Do you think he, or Jade, or my mother _wanted_ to become what they did or do what they did? They were pinned down. They were—I don't know. Things happened to them and they were sinking, they had to take the low ground decision and risk their lives and reputations for their survival. That could have easily been me. What would you do if you were put in a situation that meant dying on both ends, but at least one of them—only one—meant you might get out alive even if there was a price on your head?"

Kaldur stares at her with calm blue eyes and Artemis suddenly feels silly for the outburst.

"It sounds to me, my friend, like you have already made one of these _low ground_ decisions." She attempts to stay calm, but Kaldur's eyes and his words are calling her to panic. His voice is level and grave and raises a little when he says, "Artemis, what did you do?"

The words shatter and splinter her and in the same moment she's gone.

* * *

_"never let me go, never let me go  
never let me go, never let me go—"_

* * *

M'gann is screaming when her mind clears. "You pulled us out! We were working on his mind! And you pulled us out!" Cameron looks unfazed and states that her session time is over and she needs to go back to her holding cell while the guards change. During the conversation, his eyes slide and lock on Artemis's and a line of worry appear between his brows.

Artemis diverts her gaze.

"Tigress," Cameron's hand claps over her shoulder and she shrugs him off, turning on her heel and heads out the door, snapping for the faceless guards to keep watch on the Martian. "Hey!" Cameron gives chase through the corridor and Artemis ignores him. "Mi—"

Artemis turns and snares his wrist before it can make contact with her and pulls him into an archway where the cameras don't reach—per Kaldur's design—she shoves him away through the little given space, determined to have her own.

"Cam, you know I have a boyfriend, right?" she blurts before she can think too much on it.

"Yeah . . ." Cameron blinks and his worry dissolves into something else.

"Okay, good."

"Why?"

"Well . . . lately you're being a little . . . cuddly."

"Cuddly?"

"Yeah."

"Is that even a word?"

"So, not the point, Cam. You asked why, I'm telling you why." She snaps and regains what little control she still has to remember that their might still be speakers here. "The Martian seems to think you have feelings for me, and I want to set the record straight between us."

Cameron's eyebrows draw together and his mouth is a thin, thin line.

"What's stopping you from assuming she's telling the truth?"

She sucks in a quick breath as the words come crashing down onto her. Like the waves that rock the ship and crash into her. "It doesn't matter." She says and does the only thing she knows what to do next.

She runs.

* * *

_"and the arms of the ocean are carrying me,  
and all this devotion was rushing out of me,"_

* * *

She doesn't get far. Cameron's legs are longer.

She doesn't get far. She can barely walk a straight line.

She doesn't get far. The dead are chasing her through the halls.

"Artemis, Artemis . . ." Cameron's voice is distant and diluted like she was underwater. Like a hollow echoing in her ears, ricocheting against the walls far beyond her reach. Truth is it hasn't just been since the beginning of this mission—she hasn't slept for months. Not since that night.

* * *

_"and the crashes are heaven for a sinner like me,"_

* * *

"Artemis," her sister whispers to her left, but Artemis won't look at her. Jade's expression could say anything now. Ranging from _you don't have to _or _please, for me_, but Artemis doesn't want to look, she can't look. She wants—needs—to make this decision on her own. It's not just her and Jade now, it's her, Jade, and a life that has a chance not to be as messed up as they are.

She can't ask Master any questions that will just banter him. She'll never know this man's crime of if he committed any at all. If she does this it has to be quick, direct, no hesitation; that's the only way to shock and impress.

She knocks the arrow onto the string, her muscles reacting as they do accordingly to pull back the compound pressure and she pulls back, taking a breath and aligning her body into a warrior's stance her eyes fix on the man and his fearful face and his tears and his sweat stained shirt.

She can't make this quick.

She can't close her eyes.

She aims and releases the arrow and watches as it hits the dip above his clavicle—cold and direct. He's choking against the twisted metal and dying within seonds.

She lowers her bow and looks to Master.

Barely a second had passed, but an hour rolls by in her mind. Jade is silent and Master his appraising the loyalty of siblings, or something like that. It's a rattling of white noise in her ears though because all she can think is how when the choice finally fell to her, she sided with her darker side.

* * *

_"but the arms of the ocean—deliver me." _

* * *

"I killed him, I ki—" She gasping for air and Cameron's clutching onto her, running his hands through her hair and breathing with her through her choking sobs. "I can't—"

"What's wrong with her?" a guard asks.

"The Martian, something must have happened in the mind meld." Cameron snaps and points back to the door. "Back to your posts, I'll inform Black Manta—don't you dare even think about handling it yourselves." He says roughly and Artemis is dimly aware that she's been raised up. "I'll be back in a few."

Everything's dark and blue and quiet, but she can feel the ocean moving around her. The gentle caress from Kaldur's mind is strangling her and spilling down her throat and suffocating her.

"Artemis, Art—come back, come back to me, c'mon."

* * *

_"though the pressure's hard to take,  
it's the only way i can escape."_

* * *

Oxygen rushes to her lungs and she gasps, for her final liberate breath. Her vision is cloudy, but that doesn't stop her from looking, desperate to find Cameron's icy blues. He sighs when she does, relived. She's laying on her side, mask removed, head supported by his hand. His hand slides across her waist.

"I think you were having a panic attack. Have you been sleeping?" he asks and her head reels. He makes a face but doesn't say sorry and waits for her reply.

She opens her mouth to answer, but pauses and stops herself from lying. "No, I haven't."

"Okay," Cameron sighs and his icy breath tickles her cheek as he helps her up. She's cradled in his arms, safe and sound.

"I can walk on my—"

"No you can't," he says blatantly and crosses the length of the room to the established cot that was given to all of troopers and workers on the vessel. "You can sleep in my room until I come back. I have some damage control to cover with Black Manta."

Remembering, she sits up. "_Let me_—let me speak to him."

Cameron nudges her back down. "No. Sleep. Art, you're no good right now. You have to remember it's all about presentation to them—how well you can keep face. This isn't a good image right now. This is weakness." His voice cripples her plans to disobey and stumble down the hall looking for Black Manta to explain.

_Yes,_ she breathes in and relaxed back onto the bed. Her dark hair sprawling around her head like a crown, starkly contrast to the white pillow. "Everything I am is weakness . . ."

"No," Cameron says pulling the blanket over her as if she were a child. "You're not weakness, Art. You're strength. And if you want to regain that strength you need to take care of yourself. Now stop being an idiot and go to sleep."

She smiles tiredly up at him before drifting away.

* * *

**I hope this makes up for the wait and the fact that the show is balancing on an axis of a lighter tone. I would think Artemis might have done something bad in her past, she so desperate to keep hidden. She doesn't really talk about her problems. And this isn't her way back past, but it still lingers in her present and why would the Shadows just let Jade go? They need to bargain or make a gesture on how serious they were about this.**

**Cam and Art have a bit of a tough love thing with each other when they're freaking out.**

**Review and let me know I'm now alone!**


End file.
